excerpts from a letter to my mother’s net curtains
like you a letter should be transparenta mesh of words let go
threading the margin between surreal and
complicit
my eyewitnesses speaking in stitches
remember the frillings and trimmings
the negative acoustic of decay and disorder
cleanliness whispered to godliness
their embroidered conversations
silting the question of breath caught by streetlight
a filament between home and not-home
inside your quiet folds
the claustrophobia of domesticity
lies loosely against the tight-lipped fabric of
containment
a conjugal sieve of dust and secrets
where everything and nothing is private
grime gossip greed lust
do you still love those gothic novels
their black and white silence
their arched window violence
needle marks of motherhood
and orphaned young heroines
who must go to bed hungry night after night
dressed in these forensic veils
you can see right through me
that i am merely matter out of place
remember straining the stain of me my bed
an amniotic sac of nylon lace
Kittie Belltree’s debut poetry collection, Sliced Tongue and Pearl Cufflinks (2019), is published by Parthian. Her poems and reviews have been widely published and her short fiction has been anthologised by Honno in Cut on the Bias (2010). She works as a Specialist Tutor for neurodiverse students at Aberystwyth University, where she is completing a PhD on poetry and trauma. Tweets: @KittieBelltree
Robert Frede Kenter is a writer, visual artist, editor and publisher of Ice Floe Press. Work can be found in multiple venues and platforms, print and on-line.
Banner Art: Gastronomy, a drawing by Robert Frede Kenter. Tweets: @frede_kenter
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